Absence of Colour
by open hearts catch dreams
Summary: It seemed so out of proportion, looking back, that something so small could do something so great." "He felt like something had been stolen from him. Something precious, once in a lifetime that he could never get back." A tragedy befalls the team.


**AN: This is not the first NCIS fic I have written, but the first I have posted. The title is one I was using temporarily but it stuck anyway. It is only a one-shot. I doubt there will be more, but you never know. **

**Warning: Major Character death**

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It seemed so out of proportion, looking back, that something so small could do something so great. A single shot, a loud echoing bang of a bullet leaving a gun barrel was the only sound. And yet not five minutes later, the damage that one noise and tiny pellet of metal caused, was unchangeable. Beyond repair.

The single bang had begun to dig an endless void in Tony's heart. She was gone. Truly gone. This was not a joke or trick, not something Gibbs would work out so that they all came out okay. This was the real thing.

Gibbs could do a lot of things. He couldn't make Kate's death okay, but he made it easier. Gibbs could help him, when he had been framed. He supported McGee when he thought he shot a cop. He helped…_her_ when the guy had died in the elevator. But Gibbs could do nothing about the broken body. One that used to be filled with burning, fiery life. He felt like something had been stolen from him. Something precious, once in a lifetime that he could never get back.

He forced his attention back to the case.

The bullet had left the barrel of a revolver. There was no casing around in the still warm blood. It seemed like there was more than could have ever fitted in her small, dangerous body. Tony focused on something else. The gun had never been dropped. The killer had gotten away with the murder weapon leaving no immediately obvious evidence.

If anyone could find something, it was Abby, but her current state of mind would do little to help the investigation.

It had taken less than half and hour for Ducky, Palmer and Abby to arrive at the…crime scene.

Abby had burst into tears at the sight and Gibbs had been forced to drag her away. Despite the rocky beginning to the friendship between the Mossad assassin and the forensic scientist, they had grown close. Kate's murder had hurt Abby as much as anyone else, but she wasn't a field agent. She didn't see what the others saw. This tragedy was so close to being the final straw. Abby had nearly lost her sanity over it. She had later announced that she could find nothing. No fingerprint, hair follicle, epithelial cells, blood, DNA of other sorts, footprints or photographic evidence that a killer existed.

The only proof they had was the contents of a body bag in Autopsy.

Ducky hadn't taken it too well either. He had cried over her. Walked away and made a speechless Palmer load the gurney.

McGee had not said much. He hadn't seen Kate die. It had given him an option not granted to Gibbs or Tony. He could have not seen her. He did, eventually. By the time he did, Kate looked like she was sleeping.

_She_ didn't look like she was sleeping. Caught by surprise, her dark brown eyes were frozen forever. Staring unseeing at the sky. Her dark hair was splayed around her, partially soaked through and glistening with the ever obvious blood. A hand had fallen limp over her torso, twisted slightly at the hips. Even caught without warning, her reflexes meant she had already nearly drawn her gun when the bullet had gone through her.

The department issue SIG had fallen on its side, stained with more than blood. Stained, too, with memories. Tony would never look at that gun the same again.

Before getting on with the autopsy, all Ducky had been able to confirm was that death was instantaneous. She would have felt nothing. No pain, nor fear, relief or peace. Just nothing.

Tony would have been willing to bet, then, that should Gibbs have gone up in a stand off against a tornado, it would have come off second best. Such was Gibbs' turmoil. He nearly turned to ask how much _she _would put on it. Until he remembered she wasn't going to put anything on anything.

He felt a harsh jolt to his stomach at the thought, as if a shovel had been dug into his abdomen with blunt force. His mind pictured the ever growing void being dug inside him. A part of him wondered how such a small, faceless man could dig so deep in the time since he first felt the pain of a blunt shovel.

A glance back at the scene and he felt sick. As he forced himself not to give up last night's pizza, he felt something snap.

It was from deep inside his being. Different than a bone breaking. Or getting a sprained ankle. Even being pinched. He thought about doing it to McGee to see what happened. It wouldn't be fun if _she_ didn't tell him off. No, the snap was louder than fireworks to his ears but no more than the whisper of the wind to anyone else. Tony knew, somehow, without a doubt, it was the sound of his own soul breaking in two. Soul mates. He never told her he knew she was his. He did know it. Even before his own soul broke at losing hers.

Now she would never know.

Ducky spoke to his patients. But they never spoke back. _She_ wouldn't either.

Tony tripped over a step and felt his shin hit the one next hard enough to cut skin on the sharp edge of the rock.

The sharp sting of physical pain was a welcome release from the emotional agony. He watched the blood course down his jeans leg with a blank gaze. He offered no resistance when Ducky pushed him onto the step and bound the cut.

The world seemed oddly colourless.

He had watched movies when a couple would say that they were everything to the other. Their world was a blank canvas or white room without their partner there. He always thought it was a sappy exaggeration. He was starting to think it was the truth. His own sense of pain had dulled considerably and with it the colours of the world. Everything seemed to be turning to shades of grey and white.

The colour flooded back suddenly when Gibbs snapped his fingers in front of him. Tony looked up and, without thinking, back at the crime scene. He turned away quickly feeling bile rise again. It felt as though he would live forever with the image of her lying there. All he would see when he thought of her for some time would be her gaze. Frozen in time.

How could someone have snuck up on her? She was an assassin for heaven's sake! She killed them! Not the other way around! They didn't k-…he couldn't complete the thought. She was gone.

And it was beginning to look like they would never find who did it.

Tony slowly became aware that his cut was throbbing but he ignored it and the warm blood on the worn denim. He stood up, and fell sideways as his leg protested under the sudden weight.

Gibbs grabbed his arm and righted him.

Tony pulled away, stumbling slightly. He went back to the car. The reason they were there to start with eluded him now. It was no longer important.

Was anything ever going to be? He didn't yet know. All he knew was that now he had seen _her_ lying there, lifeless and lost in a sea of red, the world wasn't right anymore. It had been turned up on its axis and it felt like there was no way to turn it back. Soon, that world would begin to fall apart. It was only a matter of time.

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**AN:Quite upsetting, I thought. Darker than anything I usually write. Don't get me wrong. I love Ziva. And I love Tiva. But this idea would not go away. if some bits don't seem clear, that's good. It was supposed to put across Tony's confusion at the whole thing. If you want anything cleared up, message me.**


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